What you need to know
- An APK teardown of the latest beta version of the Google Search app has revealed a useful new feature coming to the Assistant.
- Google could soon allow users to turn off their phones using the Assistant.
- The feature could be exclusive to Android 12 devices.
The Google Assistant will soon let users turn off their Android phones using just their voice, according to a report from 9to5Google. The publication performed an APK teardown of the latest beta version of the Google Search app and found evidence that suggests Android 12 will add a new way to turn off your phone.
As you can see in the screenshot on the right, the latest Google Search beta update includes an in-app explainer for the new way to invoke the Assistant on the best Android phones. Since pressing and holding the Power button now allows users to access the Assistant, Google is adding two new ways to power off devices. The first one involves going to the power menu by pressing the Power button and the volume up button. The other method, which happens to be a little more interesting, requires users to open the Assistant and say "Power off."
At this point, it remains unclear if the feature will be exclusive to Android 12 or if it will be available on older Android versions as well. It also remains to be seen if the new power option is going to be limited to Google's Pixel phones.
In addition to the above two methods, Google is working on adding a button in the quick settings menu to provide quick access to the power menu. While the button isn't functional in the first Android 12 beta, it is likely to be enabled in the second or third beta.
